Due Respect for Piggy
by C.Tut Run Slowly
Summary: Piggy finally gets the respect he deserves. The boys all get together again to honor and remember Piggy, the "misfit" from the island way back when.


Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters in this story. Lord of the Flies is not my story, it belongs to William Golding, not me.  
  
25 years after their rescue from that horrendous island, Ralph, Jack, and all the no-longer-little ones have gotten together to pay due respect for their friend Piggy, who was killed while they were stranded on the island. Despite past differences between Jack and Ralph, they have decided that they will get along for the while as they honor and remember Piggy, whose real name is still a mystery to everyone but Ralph, who was given specific instructions not to tell it to anyone. Ralph, unsure of why he couldn't share Piggy's real name with anyone, reluctantly agreed, and kept his mouth shut about it. Amazingly, Piggy's Auntie's gravesite had been located in England, and an empty casket to honor Piggy could be placed in the vacant space right next to her.  
As the men gather in the narthex of a church near Cambridge, England, Jack and Ralph are forced to talk for the first time in 25 years. They do pretend to be kind to one another, but it is obvious that there is still some jealousy spouting from Ralph. Jack is still angry with Ralph for defying him, and Ralph is angry with Jack for betraying him after he had been elected "Chief". All of the other men are talking and mingling and slowly starting to recognize one another. There is a lot of chattering and catching up going on. Even Jack and Ralph seem to be having a good time. Then suddenly the room is silenced. At first, there seemed to be a distinct reason, but as the silence reached the furthest corners of the room, people were unsure why they were hushing, they just did because everyone else was.  
Men began to separate and make a sort of aisle for a certain man who had just walked through the door. He looked younger than all the others, and he had a big, dark, almost blue marking on his face. As he made his way toward Jack and Ralph, who were in the back corner, everyone soon realized why the men had hushed when they saw him. Everyone had thought that this man had been lost in the forest on the island as a boy! This had been the boy who was brave enough to come forward and confess to being afraid of the beast. No one knew his name, and he seemed to be very shy and timid.  
Ralph saw him and asked, "Where were you for all that time? How come no one ever saw you? How did you survive?"  
"In the forest, I was scared, I ate fruit," was his reply.  
"What was it we were scared about, anyway?" asked Jack.  
The nameless man said, "We were afraid of the beast, each other, ourselves."  
Ralph stood and could not remember what the beast was. He knew that there really was no beast, but that something was bad about that island. Something there was terribly wrong, but he could not remember. He turned to Jack and asked him if he could remember what the beast was or what was wrong with the island. Jack couldn't seem to remember anything either. Ralph and Jack didn't talk again for a long while.  
The church bells rang, and the men all filed into the sanctuary for the service to commemorate the beloved Piggy. All the men knew that Piggy had been a misfit on the island, and that he had been made fun of at school. They all knew that they had been unkind to him. Even Ralph had been mean to Piggy every once in a while. However, everyone also knew that Piggy had been the brains behind everything reasonable that occurred on that island. Everything that made any sense at all had been Piggy's idea. As the service began, an old pastor came into the sanctuary and began with a prayer. The prayer was simple and short, but it was effective. The pastor then went on to tell several stories about Piggy's life. He told of the time that Piggy had not gotten any meat after the first pig was killed on the island. Jack had said it was because he didn't help to hunt, but Ralph hadn't either, and he still got meat. Simon, the other boy who died on the island, had given up his meat so that Piggy could have his share. Jack had forced Simon to eat some.  
The pastor continued to tell stories about Piggy and his glasses and the debt that everyone owed to Piggy and his specs. No one realized it, but every man in that church owed his life to Piggy. Their lives were owed to him because if he hadn't had glasses, the fire never would have been started. If the fire hadn't been taken out of control, the boys never would have been rescued, and they all would have died on the island. Ralph began to wonder how this pastor had gotten all this information about the life of Piggy. Sniffling was heard from the rear of the church. Ralph turned around to see who it was, and to his surprise, Jack had started crying in the back of the church. He had intentionally placed himself in the back pew, as far away from Ralph as he possibly could. Ralph couldn't help thinking about the day that the boys had been rescued. Everyone had cried that day, even Jack. They had all felt as if they could finally let out their feelings. They no longer had to be adults. They were finally allowed to be children again, but they didn't know how.  
Suddenly, Jack arose from his place in the back of the small church, and began walking toward the altar very slowly. He was crying, and he had something in his hand: something that no one could see because his fingers were wrapped so tightly around it. When he finally made it to the front of the church, he placed the object on the altar, and slowly walked back to his seat. He was now sobbing, and not a soul knew why. He sat down, and continued to cry. Ralph knew exactly what Jack had placed on the altar. It was Piggy's glasses.  
Jack had kept the glasses after all these years. He had attacked and stolen them from Piggy, leaving him effectively blind. He had stolen them so that he and his tribe could have fire. Ralph remembered making an effort to retrieve the glasses, but giving up because Piggy was killed that day. The boulder had fallen on him, and he fell, dead, into the sea. Piggy died blind, but now he had his glasses back. He could see again. Now everything that had happened on the island could be forgiven, and Jack and Ralph could even start a friendship.  
After the service for Piggy was over, Ralph asked Jack to meet him at his car. When Jack got there, Ralph had a large object in both hands what was covered with a piece of cloth. Ralph looked at Jack with a certain sparkle in his eye. Jack removed the cloth impatiently, only to reveal the sacred conch that Piggy had valued so greatly and protected to well.  
As all the men said their goodbyes and made promises to keep up with one another that were bound to be broken, Ralph began to drive away. He quickly and unexpectedly slammed on his brakes when he read the sign outside the church. The sign read "Trinity Methodist Church, Cambridge, England. Services given by the Reverend Roger Sterling." The whole service made sense now. Roger had called all the men together, but no one had seen him there. No one could figure out which man was him. That's how the pastor knew all the stories about Piggy. That's why Roger hadn't been with all the other men. Ralph now knew that Roger had really respected Piggy; he just went along with Jack and his tribe so as not to get in trouble with the others. Roger was a good man after all. Ralph resolved to come back to this church sometime in the near future to reunite with Roger. He wanted to talk to him and thank him for paying respect to Ralph's dear friend Piggy, who had been accidentally killed by Jack and his tribe, including Roger.  
Terrible things happened on that island, many of them inexplicable, but somehow it was all due to their instincts as people.  
  
Author's Note: PLEASE review this story... this is my first FanFiction. Don't be too mean in the reviews. Depending on the reviews, there may be more chapters to come. I had fun writing this one because I just finished reading the book for my English class, and my full-book assignment was to track Piggy as a character. I thought that it was wrong that Piggy never got the respect that he deserved, so I decided to write this and give it to him. I'm sorry this isn't the best of storylines, but I thought it was kind of interesting. 


End file.
